If you're a Mills & Boon fan...
..here's another couple of romatic reads in the M&B mould...
Passions’ Fortune: The Story of Mills & Boon by Joseph McAleer
This is the first history of Mills & Boon, the British publishing phenomenon which has become a household name, synonymous with romantic fiction. On the firm's 90th anniversary, Joseph McAleer has written the first history of Mills & Boon, drawing upon a long-lost archive of over 50,000 letters which reveal the intricate relationship between editorial policy, social attitudes, and sales. McAleer examines the dictates of the Mills & Boon formula and demonstrates how novels were 'Managed' by the firm to ensure maximum sales and to nurture a cadre of loyal readers in Britain and throughout the Commonwealth. The result is a cultural phenomenon whose 'product' reflected the attitudes and morals of the age while offering women an addictive escape from everyday life. It's a fascinating read for anyone who's ever wondered about writing a Mills & Boon, or wants to understand the story behind one of the most successful British firms of the twentieth century.
My Mistress’s Sparrow is Dead: Great Love Stories from Checkov to Munro; Edited by Jeffrey Eugenides
A wide-ranging and eclectic collection of short stories on the theme of love in its various forms: romantic, erotic, impossible, undying and exhausted, edited by Pulitzer Prize winner Jeffrey Eugenides. No other aspect of the human experience regularly inspires such an outpouring of poetry, prose and philosophy as love. From passionate declarations to clinical analysis, writers of every age have been fascinated, tormented and inspired by love. This beautifully produced collection of short stories will combine the best of contemporary and classic fiction on the theme of love, from Catullus to Alice Munro. Edited and introduced by the Pulitzer prize-winning author of Middlesex, this wonderfully heterodox look at love will include, amongst others, A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner; The Lady with the Lapdog by Anton Chekhov and The Dead by James Joyce, as well as stories by Lorrie Moore, Milan Kundera and Guy de Maupassant and historical selections ranging from the letters of Heloise and Abelard to examples of courtly love.
